Surecutter,
The only reason I bought an Expression is because of SCAL. Had I been limited to using only cartridges and not cutting artwork that I create would not have worked for me. I use my Expression mostly for cutting Vinyl with a few paper cuts here and there. SCAL is the best and it will save you money and the possibilities are endless.

i cant get my scal to cut it keeps coming up error this has happened since design studio told me i had to update
it happened once before but i cant seem to get it to work this time please please can someone help me i miss my scal
thanks

Okay, now I am having problemsl. I never updated my firmware since the first time when I had to to get SCal because there was so many problems with people having to go back and forth. Now I went ahead and updated my SCAL version and it will not cut with my cricut. My firmware says version 1.1. Does this mean I am going to have to update my firware version again and all that just to get SCAL to work right again? Very Frustrated right now!

When I update the new version of SCAL, do I need to send another payment? I am so new at this and trying to absorb all the information in this forum is mind boggling. Thanks for all the help, tips and files. P

Ok,
I have the Cricut Expressions machine. I bought it last November (early Christmas gift to myself!). I have been playing with it and trying to buy the cartridges that I like but we all know how expensive that can be. Then I came across the Craft Edge website, was a bit skeptical about this really working with my Cricut machine, but have since been convinced since everyone here seems to have nothing but praise for it! So, I purchased the software the other day. It came this morning, I put the cd in the computer downloaded the program only to find out that my Cricut machine is the 2.0 version. Now I am reading the back of the software package and in the right hand corner it says that my Cricut machine has to have the firmware version of 2.1 or 2.3 for the Expressions machine and that it can be upgraded using the Cricut Design Studio software (free trialware or the full licensed version). Now I'm lost. Does this mean that I have to go buy the design studio software so that my SCAL will be updated permanently to the firmware versions of 2.1 or 2.3 and if I only download the trial version, do I only get the firmware update temporarily? So should I go to the Cricut website and download the trial version so that I can use my new SCAL software? My other question is how do I know which version of the SCAL software I have??? Since I just bought it a few days ago, do I need to do the upgrades that I have seen posted in the forum? I'm sorry this is long, but I want to start playing and not sure that I am doing any of this right!

The free trial version of DS will only cut with George, or Plantin Schoolbook. The firmware update is not a limited time thing though - it actually updates your machine. Once you have updated your firmware, you can keep the DS trial version or delete it; it is not needed to run SCAL. If you recently purchased SCAL, you shouldn't need to update. Future updates are free, though.